


dig

by poalimal



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Accidental Bonding, Creature Fic?, Dubious Consent, Gen, HP Trope Bingo, Love at First Sight, M/M, POC Harry Potter, Powerful Harry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-21
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-05-09 18:52:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14721672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poalimal/pseuds/poalimal
Summary: '--I take it that doesn't happen normally?' said Potter.





	1. Chapter 1

 

The lovers met by moonlight  
The first [woman] was crimson,  
the second ran wet her [myrrh?]  
The river ran over and the sun rose up  
And the day found them [bound]  
in earth and [blood] and love.

\- K. Olayinke, The River, 13.200-205.

 

I cannot possibly overstate the oversimplification of the term _soulmates_. In fact, in nearly every single mytho-historic instance we could point to -- Layla and Majnun, Rhiannon and Pwyll, even Makeda and Solomon -- there are strong suggestions that at least one of the lovers was enthralled...The difficulty of interpreting a historically amorphous concept like consent means that we simply don't know if the more magically powerful partner was even aware of mentally and emotionally subduing their lover(s).

\- Y. Nakamura, _In Defiance of Death: Tracking the Marriage Bond in the Magical Community, From Antiquity to Present_

 

I knew the very moment he died. It was as if a part of my soul left with him.

\- A. Dumbledore, private journals

  
I.

It was pure chance that Blaise happened to be there. If his meeting with Veraglindis hadn't run over, he would've been halfway cross the world when Harry Potter showed up. It was the rare meeting with VG that did not run over, of course: this one was hardly an exception.

So it was that he was leaning against the front desk and waiting for his wand back from Zuile when a soft cough pulled his attention.

Blaise looked up, and there he was. Harry Potter - shorter than memory supplied.

Blaise's heart swooped - and then plummeted.

'Er,' said Harry Potter, scratching the back of his neck. 'Hullo, there. I'm here for, um. A 2 o'clock appointment?' It was now nearing 5 o'clock. 'I know I'm a bit...late.'

A bit late! Blaise blinked at him. 'Hm. Do you know who it is you're meant to see?' he said, when he had finally recovered his mental faculties.

Potter took out a crumpled bit of parchment and scowled down at it. Bit of a grim-faced fellow. 'Er...Marah-Sellee? M--Maura-Sali?'

Ah, Maraceli, he meant. 'I think there must have been some confusion,' said Blaise, hesitantly. 'Maraceli doesn't work on Thursdays. Are you quite sure it's for today?'

'Yes. Oh. Well.' Potter grimaced down at the parchment some more. 'Maybe not, actually. I think this might say...does that look like a 7 or an 8 to you?'

Blaise took the parchment in his hand and gave it a thorough once-over. 'It doesn't look like any living human language,' he concluded, handing it back. Perhaps Akkadian? 'Did your secretary write that? You might need a new one.'

' _I_ wrote it,' said Potter, frowning.

'Oh, well, good news for your secretary, then,' he said, smiling cajolingly. Potter did not laugh. Ah, well. 'Anyway, I can, ah. I can take down your information now? And we can send you new appointment details.'

Potter hesitated. 'Er, well. Do you actually work here?'

It was then that Blaise realised that Harry Potter had no idea who he was. Had no idea that he was the owner of the Magic Physiotherapy Centre in which they were currently stood; probably did not even remember that they'd been to school together. Had just walked up to him and demanded information because he was standing there. And had _looked_ helpful.

Well. Blaise was hardly going to introduce himself and embarrass them both. 'Perfectly understandable, sir. I'm an alternate therapist,' he said smoothly. 'I usually come in on the weekends. Or when there's overflow.'

It was, he thought with only a little guilt, certainly true on paper, if not in spirit.

Potter broke out in a brilliant smile. Blaise politely looked away. 'Oh, well, that's great, then! Can't you just--you know, do the--the stuff?' The _stuff_? 'Er, the therapeutic--stuff?' He coughed. 'Only, I've got to get my leg looked at before Sunday or Kings'll have my head.'

Kings? Short for Kingsley Shacklebolt, no doubt. Was Potter threatening him? He hardly seemed the type. Best to find out precisely what type he was, then.

'I don't know if that will be possible,' said Blaise, testing him. 'We are closing soon...'

'Please, could we do it just this one time?' said Potter, coming closer. 'I would really appreciate it.'

As a threat, Blaise thought sourly, it was shockingly ineffective. And where on earth had Zuile gone off to?

'Oh all right,' he said, sighing, leaning over the desk to look for a quillboard. He felt the burst of satisfaction from Potter like the sun on his skin. Merlin. It was enough to make the hair on his arms stand up. 'I'll do this first session, then we'll get you down for a proper introductory session with Maraceli next week.'

'Yes, yes, absolutely,' said Potter, directly behind him. 'Now where do you want me?'

Blaise turned around and took a quick step back. 'Fill this out first,' he said, holding out the quillboard between them. 'Then go down to the locker room down the hall on your left. You can leave your wand in one of the cubbies there. It will be returned to you at the end of your session.'

Potter, nicknamed Ickle Killer by certain unsavoury news outlets, clearly struggled with this last part. 'Is that really necessary? I'd be much more comfortable with my wand on me.'

Blaise smiled genuinely. 'Fortunately this isn't about your comfort,' he said, 'but your _growth_. You can follow the signs to Room 5 when you're done changing.'

Potter scowled.

 

* * *

 

'You grew up with Muggles, didn't you?' said Blaise, while they were stretching. Well. While _he_ was stretching. Potter was, on his side of the room, breathing hard and poorly bending. His brown cheeks were deep and red, so he looked well and truly angry when he glared up at Blaise. Celi was certainly going to have her work cut out for her.

'Yea? Why's that relevant?' said Potter, rather aggressively. Oh. Right.

'I'm working my way up to a metaphor,' said Blaise languidly, pulling his leg back. 'It works better if you understand Muggle mechanics.'

Potter perked up at that - then nearly kicked Blaise in the face. 'Oh! er. Sorry.'

'It's fine,' said Blaise, still sweating from Potter's little mini-strop. This was shaping up to be the longest 45 minutes in human history. 'So we tend to think of the Muggle bike as the perfect unit.'

'--Do we now,' said Potter.

'We certainly do,' said Blaise, trying not to smile at the wave of amusement he felt enter the room. It was just that Potter felt everything so _strongly_. 'At least the people in my field tend to do so.' He did not mention that his field consisted of about ten people, all of whom he had personally spread the gospel truth of The Muggle Bike metaphor to.

'And, ergh--why is, why is that?' asked Potter, toppling over.

'All of its elements working in perfect harmony for one purpose: _movement_ ,' said Blaise. The spiel was easy to fall into. It was almost enough to make him forget Potter's core steaming hot air like a leaky dragon.

'I see,' said Potter, standing to his feet. 'One part stops working, the whole thing fails, right?'

'Oh, not at all,' said Blaise, blinking up at him, trying to breathe in more deeply. For a moment he lost his train of thought and just fell to staring. Potter quirked his eyebrows.

How mortifying. Blaise quickly found something else to look at. 'You can still technically ride a bike with bad tires, for example - you just need to take more patience or care, if you do. Otherwise you could put yourself in a lot of danger.

'We understand that you don't always replace bad tires on time - sometimes you don't know how, or you don't think it's possible, or you just don't want to. Sometimes the tires have sentimental value, sometimes replacing them is just too expensive. There's a bunch of reasons they could get worn out.

'And we don't blame the tires for wearing out, we know that's just an effect of their function. But you and I need to understand what it looks like when you are worn out. Otherwise you'll just be at a standstill and you won't know why you're not moving.'

'Um. You're very... passionate about this,' Potter observed. 'I really thought this was just about my leg? Like, I can't always feel it, but I don't think it's bad, really.' Blaise did not immediately reply. 'To be honest, I thought we'd be doing less stretching and more. like. Massaging.' And he stared beseechingly. Saints _above_.

'I think I'll leave any massaging to your actual therapist,' Blaise said, carefully. 'This session is just so you can tell your boss you went, yes? So why don't you consider this a seminar on the theory behind what magical physiotherapists do.'

'Oh, my favourite kind,' said Potter. A joke, perhaps.

'We can stretch in silence,' said Blaise, exhaling slowly, disappointed somehow, 'if you prefer.' It was entirely unreasonable, he knew, to expect Potter to be anywhere as interested in Blaise as he was in him.

'No,' said Potter. 'That's fine.'

They finished stretching in silence anyway.

'Er, what was that you were saying about the bike? Earlier?' said Potter, breathing hard. 'It was very, ahm. Very interesting.'

'I'm sure you found it fascinating,' Blaise said, smiling warmly. Potter stared at him with tilted head, clearly trying to figure out if he was being sarcastic. Greater minds than his had tried. 'But now we're going to go ahead and do a few visualisation techniques. Here, sit down across from me - yes, there's fine, copy my posture. No, curve your back more. That's it. Relax your shoulders. Here, like this. Breathe in - hold that posture, hold that posture, hold that posture - and breathe out. Good. Very good. Close your eyes. How do you feel?'

Potter's eyes flickered once, twice beneath his eyelids. 'Like... like I'm on the cusp of a breakthrough,' he said breathlessly. And he raised one eye open to show that he was joking.

Blaise did not roll his eyes even after Potter had closed his again because he was a professional, and also because patients could always tell when you thought they were being annoying unless you were very, very careful.

'And besides that?' he pressed. 'Since your injury, for example, have you noticed a decrease in your sense of taste, smell or sound?'

'Er, no,' Potter hedged. He coughed. 'I'm actually fine. Just a bit tired? It's just the feeling goes in and out of my leg from time to time.' He swallowed. 'I'm also, ah. Sorry about peeving you off. I did like your speech earlier. You got really excited.'

'Never mind that,' said Blaise. 'If something isn't working for you, you should say so. That's entirely the purpose of your being here.' Yet somehow that made Potter frown. Ah, well. No pleasing some Saviours, was there. Blaise closed his eyes, too, if only so he could stop being so distracted.

'Onto these visualisation techniques, then,' he said briskly. 'They're meant to help you increase your awareness of your surroundings, and of your own energy output. We tend to visualise magical output as thermal energy, because strong outbursts usually register as some kind of heat to our immediate senses.

'Often people are unaware of how much energy they give off, especially when they've been hurt, so these techniques will help you better identify what it looks like and feels like when you're on the cusp of an outburst. Now do you know where you are?'

'I'm,' said Potter, sounding confused, 'in a room? In a room... with you.'

'Yes, that's correct! Now I want you to try to push out with your magic and map out the room.' Potter closed his eyes and scrunched up his face, more curious than concentrating. Around them, the whole building made a low groaning sound, as if it were being squeezed in some kind of vice. Blaise calmed his heart and reached for Potter's hand. Potter startled, his eyes flashing open briefly, beautifully - and then he opened his hand to Blaise's and held on.

Potter's hand was quite-- warm.

'Steady on,' Blaise said gently. 'We don't want to knock the walls down, do we? No, we just want to see them. Can you see them?'

'I see them,' said Potter. 'They're...walls.' He paused. 'Is there another room on the other side of this one?'

Ah. He meant the observation room. He wasn't supposed to be able to sense that. 'Yes, very good,' Blaise praised. 'That's the observation room.'

Potter's hand tightened its grip. His ring was probably going to leave an indent. 'Is someone watching?' he asked. 'I don't remember being asked if we could be observed.'

'No, no one's watching,' said Blaise. 'Reach out and check for yourself.' He felt a coldness in the room as Potter pushed all of himself towards and through the south wall. Blaise fought down a shiver.

'All right. There's no one there,' said Potter, still tightly gripping Blaise's hand. 'You know, I don't think it's right to have that room and not tell people.'

'We did tell you in the paperwork you signed,' Blaise reminded him. 'And it's nothing untoward, you know. Observation is really the only way we can help each other improve.' He felt more than saw Potter's flat displeasure at this. 'All right. You'll be notified ahead of time if any of your sessions are going to be observed. Is that all right?'

'Yea,' said Potter, now bent to the task of further investigating the room. 'That's fine.' He paused. 'You know, this room feels good. Like--happy. I don't know.'

Blaise struggled to keep his voice and face neutral. 'That is very gratifying to hear,' he said carefully. 'We have tried very hard to make this a positive space.'

As he was speaking, something lapped at the tips of his fingers, the sides of his neck. 'Oh,' said Potter softly. 'Is that--is that you?'

Blaise smiled. 'Yes, that's me.' He couldn't help but laugh at the quickening onslaught of Potter's magic. It felt like being jumped all over by a very warm, very curious wave. He startled a little as the feeling ran up his legs and suffused his limbs. Extremely curious, then.

When the wave met against the walls surrounding his core, he patted Potter's hand softly with his other hand. 'Yes, well done. Now what you want to do is replicate this, only now--'

The wave swallowed him whole. He was in sun. He was in silence.

 

* * *

 

He was asleep.

 

* * *

 

He woke to fingers stroking his hair. He found his tongue sticking to the top of his mouth, dry. Blearily, he opened his eyes. It must have gone hours. The room was dark, and his head was in Potter's lap.

'--I take it that doesn't happen normally?' said Potter, very softly.

It felt like every single cell in Blaise's body was tingling: the waking of a dead limb. 'No,' he croaked. He swallowed hard. 'No, that doesn't normally happen.' He let his eyes fall closed. 'You're not-- ujh-- you have. Train. S'dange. You cou'h hrhh.' He licked his lips uselessly, tried to think. 'You could hurt someone.'

Potter was still but for the moving of his hand. 'Did I hurt you?'

Blaise tried to sit up and tilted sideways, trembling hard. Potter caught him in his arms and held him fast. It seemed suddenly he could smell not only all of Potter, but everyone who had been in this room recently.

'I'd'hh know,' Blaise replied, buried in the warmth of Potter's neck - and he was gasping suddenly, alive, awake now, more awake than he had been in years. 'What did you do?'

'I don't _know_ ,' said Potter, still holding Blaise close, two hands at his back, and then another, warm at his belly, calming him and grounding him. No, he realised, not a hand; it was something else. Like warm thick water, like melting honey, ah--

his senses tumbled away.

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dubious consent tag really comes into play here.

 

II.

Time flowed like a stream, out of which he could pluck only a few too-bright moments: the taste of sweetness, of salt, at his lips, on his tongue; the heat of a desert keeping him sleepy and sane; a small child poking him in the chin.

Blaise blinked. The child blinked back.

'Where--' he started, mouth impossibly dry.

The child reared back in startled delight, scrambling off the bed and out a door.

'Mu-u-um!' they hollered. 'He's awake!'

The sound sliced cleanly through him, leaving his head ringing. He looked around in total silence, and recognised not a single thing around him.

A vague sense of panic bubbled up in him. He stood up to see out of the window. His legs quite nearly failed him. From the tree outside, it looked like autumn. His last memory was of June.

He had to get out of here. He had to find Faisal before it was too late.

'You're awake!' said Potter, in the doorway behind him. Blaise silently made note of what it felt like to see him standing there.

'Why don't you sit down?' said Potter. 'Healers said we weren't to move you.' Blaise sat. And he watched Potter walk around the side of the bed. 'Oh, are you cold? You're shaking like a leaf!'

'No, not cold,' said Blaise, eventually. But he held himself very straight and still while Potter fussily arranged the blue throw round his shoulders, over the jumper and four Warming charms.

Potter, for his part, appeared to be wearing Muggle clothes, too: a thick plaid shirt, stretched over his shoulders, and a pair of well-fitting joans. Janes?

'Geans,' Blaise remembered, and he reached out and touched the clasp-like button in the middle. Why he did that, he could not say.

'What, you like jeans?' Potter chuckled, leaning down close. He smelled of very strong coffee. Blaise stared closely at Potter's face, at his nose and lips and throat; and he felt his mouth fill with water.

'--I should go,' he said, retreating with his hands in his lap. He had chosen to lock up all desire within himself behind the veil years and years ago. That he felt it now - with a near stranger, at that - disturbed him very deeply.

'Well, the Healers will be here soon,' said Potter, bending down till he was leaning back on his haunches, eyes near level with Blaise's ribs. Blaise's heart began to thump very loudly indeed. 'They'll want to take a look at you,' Potter continued. 'You were asleep for...a while.' And he looked into Blaise's face very carefully.

'A while'? How long was that?

Potter hesitated when Blaise asked. 'A few weeks,' he said, and Blaise knew somehow that he wasn't telling the truth. 'Lily (my daughter), my daughter Lily--she calls you Sleeping Beauty.' He laughed, and then nearly teetered over.

At the last moment, he accidentally grabbed onto Blaise's legs for balance. A jolt went all throughout Blaise's body, burrowing right into the heart of him. He kept his breathing even through great force of will. Their eyes met - and then Potter let him go. And he sprawled out clumsily onto the floor.

'Whoops,' he muttered, glancing up. As if Blaise couldn't recognise a dive when he saw one.

'Are you all right?' he asked, a bit coolly.

'Just clumsy,' said Potter, 'this leg, you know.' His leg was still giving him problems? No, it was-- Blaise shifted, and found he was soaking with sweat under each arm. He shut away his curiosity, shook off the Warming charms. This could not be his problem. He had to leave.

'Potter,' he said, quietly, 'could you get me a glass of water, please?' Potter, as expected, narrowed in on his wording, near flying to his feet to comply.

Of course, he barely made it three steps out the door before he turned back, a sheepish look on his face and a Summoned glass of water in his hand - but by then Blaise was already Apparating away.

 

* * *

 

A mere two-hundred odd km away, and Blaise still staggered to the floor from the force of Potter's fear and panic. Perhaps they were his own. His entire body did feel rather like a sliced open wound. Truth tell it, he'd been nowhere near ready to make that kind of jump. But it was the only way to have done things. Potter would thank him when it was all over, really. Better: they mightn't ever speak.

'Hullo, my dear,' said Faisal, absently. Blaise groaned, and tried to convince his body to move. After a while, Faisal appeared over him, blinking wide in concern. At least he'd bothered to put his book down this time.

'What's all this, then?' He peered down at Blaise. 'Have you gotten... married, is it?'

' _I_ haven't gotten married to anyone,' Blaise snapped, trying unsuccessfully to sit up. 'Somebody has gotten married to _me_!'

Faisal smiled slightly. 'As always, Blaise, you make me feel like a young man.' He dragged Blaise up with one hand and set him down sinking in the chair with the other, smelling of copper and pine. 'Well, then, let's take a look here.' He threw a few dazzling charms Blaise's way - then paused. 'Hm.'

'What,' Blaise panicked, 'what's happened? Can you undo it?'

'Of course I can,' said Faisal, waving away his concern. 'It is just a badly formed bond wreaking a bit of havoc on your core.' _A bit of havoc_. Saints save him from Faisal's gift for understatement! 'It's not that. It's just-- you feel different.' He blinked. 'Ah. I see it now. Your block is gone!'

Blaise blanked his face. 'My what is gone?'

Faisal stowed his wand and patted Blaise's shoulders gently. Blaise tried not to wince. 'That thing of which we do not normally speak - which you have let gut you like a godless fish for nearly a decade - is gone.'

Perhaps it was the pain; perhaps it was the veil being gone; perhaps it was hearing what Faisal had really thought of him all this time - whatever it was, Blaise was horrified to find tears leaping to his eyes. 'Do fish even believe in God?' he tried to joke. It came out as more of a gasp.

'Oh my dear,' said Faisal, gathering him up in his formidable arms. 'We all believe in something.' And he looked at Blaise kindly. 'I wish you would believe that sex does not have to bruise you. That it should not take more than you are willing to give.'

'I don't think it _bruises_ me,' said Blaise, trying to control himself. 'It destroys me.'

Faisal sighed and set him down so gently in the chair once more he might as well have floated. 'Oh my heart,' he said sadly. 'I did not mean to wound you. Let us not fight.'

But Blaise felt tired and misunderstood, and could only sit there miserably while Faisal tried to fix him. By and by the vice of fear and tumult that had pressed upon his heart began to ease - and the sudden cessation of pain loosed his eyes entirely, and he buried his face in his hands and wept.

'Oh, Blaise,' said Faisal, tearing up, too, 'my Blaise, my kindness, please do not cry!'

And it was then, listening to Faisal's crumbling apologies, that the hair on the back of Blaise's neck began to stand up. He blinked back his tears and looked up, beyond Faisal to the front door of shop, confused. 'What--?' he started, swallowing hard.

Then there came the _crack!_ , and the wave of heat. And he was unsurprised to see Harry Potter standing there, wand at the ready.

 

* * *

 

'What are you doing to him?' demanded Harry, whirling on Faisal. 'Why is he crying?' Then, to Blaise: 'Are you all right?'

'I'm _fine_ ,' said Blaise, scrubbing his cheeks with his hands, 'I'm just a bit stressed! This utter maniac keeps trying to _marry_ me, you see.'

Harry's eyes went flinty. 'That is a _crime_ , I'll have you know,' he said to Faisal. Startled, Faisal began laughing. 'Sir, do I _look_ like I'm joking--'

'I meant you, Potter,' said Blaise tiredly, one hand over his eyes.

Harry went silent. Blaise spread his fingers enough to peek at him with one eye - and the expression of pure scepticism he saw on Harry's face pushed him to rage.

'I don't mean that as any kind of comment on my appeal,' he snapped, forcefully bringing his hands down. 'Obviously it was an accident! And I'm trying to fix it now, aren't I? I mean, it's hardly _my_ fault you're one of the most powerful Lords of our age and no one ever bothered to teach you anything like control. But I guess you won't be responsible for that, either, will you? So why don't you just chalk this up to another one of your costly accidents and bloody well leave _me_ out of it.'

When Harry walked towards him, he felt his body tighten into an almost painful awareness. God be a fish... and heaven just a bowl.

'I'll be responsible,' said Harry. 'Let me be responsible.'

'Young man--' said Faisal, in very precise English.

'You can't,' said Blaise, barely daring to blink, to breathe. 'You can't.'

'Sure I can,' said Harry, pressing through all layers of him without so much as a shiver of effort. Blaise melted back into the cushions of the chair, unseeing, barely hearing. He had never known his mouth to make those kinds of noises. 'Is that better? It's just. I know you were in pain.'

And Blaise shuddered and came.

' _Out_ ,' said Faisal harshly, to his wards. And Harry's presence vanished from that place.

Faisal began speaking to him, comforting words surely, but the world went by in a grey haze: for Harry was not there.

And he curled up and went cold.

 

* * *

 

That night, for the first time in many years, he dreamt.

The inside of the tent was smoky and hot. His head he could not raise, and his insides felt like boiling water.

Speak, someone said, but he could not speak. A hand came near his mouth, and he knew it, and he loved the person it belonged to. He kissed his lover's palm, and sucked the webbing between their finger and thumb; and he tasted the skinsalt in his mouth and was healed.

His lover was startled somehow. So he took their hand and placed it over his heart, beating madly. Do you see? Do you understand? he asked, and his voice was strong and clear.

Lay back down, his lover chided, unravelling their bodies, you have been sick for some time. But he would not calm until his lover lied beside him.

A cup, bitter-smelling and cold, was placed at his lips.

Drink, they said gently; and he loved them, so he drank. The world seemed to fade away between them. The last thing he felt was his lover's cheek beneath his grasping hands.

Sleep, they said, lips close enough to kiss.

So they two kissed; so he alone slept.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

 III.

The mother-henning became suffocating after a month.

So Blaise sent a message to VG, left Faisal, and went to see his mother in the sinking saltwater city of Odo. She greeted him at the doors of the castle with a kiss on both cheeks and a 1324 bottle of singing-wine.

'For your birthday,' she said kindly, though in all likelihood he had probably interrupted her in the midst of trying to get it open. He handed his bag off to the Hover and opened the bottle up on the spot. He called a few wandering cups to him - there was company over, it seemed - and poured out a finger of song for them both.

'Thank you, dear,' his mother said, sighing, 'I tell you, you picked just the right moment to stop in. Morella took ill this morning so my table is com _pletely_ uneven. Samad, the poor dear, is feeling terribly awkward without anyone to talk to.' She took a long peering look at him as he sipped his cup, unspeaking. 'Oh, my,' she said, horrified, 'you've been _ensnared_.'

'I'm aware, thank you,' Blaise said. He had not sung in some time. His voice was thready and spare. 'It was an accident. An untrained Lord unveiled me. I was-- unprepared for how much it affected me.'

'That veil is only meant to be worn for a few hours at most,' said his mother, 'And you have been wearing it for years! I have never interfered in your life if I could help it, Blaise, but please, let your body awaken once more. I beg you, do not put it on again.'

'No,' Blaise sighed, 'no, I do not think I could.' He could hear, down the hall and through the open archway, light flowing laughter coming in from the garden. The thought of speaking with anyone else, much less a whole bevy of strangers, exhausted him so much that he began to feel very ill indeed. 'Mama...'

She sighed, and shooed him away. 'Go now,' she said. 'Your bed's been made up for you. Don't forget to thank Anise in the morning. She's missed you very much, you know.' She paused, and looked at him fully. 'And Blaise - stay longer than a week this time, won't you?'

The thing about Blaise's mother that made her so wonderful to be around was her completely anonymous way of loving the people around her. She was witty and clever and charming, certainly, but beyond even all that, she was kind: in spite of the Curse, she would still give the coat off her back if you so much as happened to shiver.

And yet she had a pushing-away manner to her. As if she wanted you to be comfortable while you were here... but she was expecting you to leave by the end of the night. Blaise had never figured out how much of that was the Curse. All he'd known, growing up, was that it had been lonely. He'd long ago fallen out of the habit of needing her. In fact she still made him feel very alone, all these years later. It had taken him a long time to realise that this was just her way - that she'd been alone a lot longer than he could even fathom.

Blaise, of course, did not say any of this. He simply nodded, and followed his bobbing bags up the stairwell into the dark.

 

* * *

 

Again he dreamt.

He was naked in the ocean. His lover was on the shore, but would come no closer. And Blaise would die before he beckoned. So he dove down into the water, and swam a league away.

No voice called him. His lover he left behind.

 

* * *

 

He awoke hungry and drowning in sweat, half-convinced in the heat that he would open his eyes and see Harry there. But he was alone in his room. He catalogued his disappointment quickly, then put it away to look at later.

The halls of the castle were cool and dark and quiet, even through his slippers. The guests had all gone, his mother and Anise were probably in bed. Any midnight snacking would have to be dealt with personally. As Blaise went down the backstairs to the kitchens, his robe came undone. He did not bother to fix it.

The Hover followed him slowly down. 'I didn't mean to wake you,' he said apologetically. 'I can cook for myself now, you know.'

The Hover dipped unsteadily in response, then began to quietly dust around him. It was an older edition, purchased years ago, perhaps his mother's single concession to Anise's advancing age.

He had the oil heating on low and was chopping up the onion, garlic and thyme, when he realised that he wasn't alone. A stranger stood in the opening to the kitchens, watching him. In the dim lighting he could see their eyes were large and kohl-lined, their shirtsleeves rolled and wrinkled, their shoulders big and broad.

Blaise's heart tripped down to his feet - he immediately fell in love.

'Hm,' he said, turning back to his knife. 'Who are you, then?'

'Oh! I'm sorry to stare,' said the stranger. 'I'm Samad. And you must be-- the Lady's son? Are you feeling better? We heard you took ill.'

'Oh yes,' said Blaise, 'much better, thank you.' He fussed over the rice, draining it clumsily. 'I, er, I hope I didn't wake you?'

'No, no, really, I should be going soon anyway. I've got a conference to go to in the morning. Ferry only runs once every three hours, you know. I missed the last one, and your mother offered to let me stay the night,' they said. They glanced at him once, then away. 'Ah, your robe's come undone there.'

'Ah,' said Blaise, embarrassed, rewrapping it tight around himself, 'sorry, sorry!'

'Nothing to be sorry at,' said Samad, smiling kindly. They had a lovely gap between their two front teeth. Blaise felt weak all in his chest. 'A body's just a body, after all.'

Something about the phrase struck him as familiar and clanged around in his head. 'Oh,' said Blaise, in sinking realisation, 'you're that poet.'

Samad's laugh was loud and lovely. Blaise tried not to be charmed. 'Sorry to disappoint!' they said. 'I used to be an accountant, if it helps. I was very good.'

'Were you really,' said Blaise drily, now on better footing. He'd spent all of his childhood and much of his youth surrounded by faulty fawning wordsmiths. Samad would hardly be the first to take his mother on as a muse.

'Absolutely not,' Samad said easily. 'I've got no head for numbers, I'm afraid. No, poetry's it for me. Your accent is utterly charming, by the way.'

'It is not,' Blaise said, embarrassed, switching to English. Damn his father and his posh accent anyway. 'Do you eat meat?'

'Why,' said Samad, also in English, 'are you going to cook for me?'

'No,' said Blaise, 'it's only polite to ask. Some people have allergies. Or moral obligations. You know.'

Samad sat down at the counter. 'Well! I'm allergic to pine nuts _and_ moral obligations, as it happens. You can go ahead and write that down. Just in case you need it, for future reference.'

Blaise stared at them and sighed. 'Of course you'd be funny,' he said, wistfully. A sense of humour in a poet: what a waste!

But Samad simply laughed aloud. 'You're quite funny yourself,' they said. 'Come, what brings you back here? The Lady tells us you spend most of your time in London these days?'

'Oh, you know, this and that,' Blaise said, for his holding a long-term occupation embarrassed even close friends. And for Samad to be invited the night over meant they must be very close indeed to his mother.

'I wonder,' said Samad, thoughtfully, 'would you happen to know Imelda? She's a dear friend. If I hadn't brought her up at dinner, I wouldn't have even known you were all related.'

'Oh, Imelda's a different branch of the family,' Blaise said - the politic way of saying the Zabinis had never formally acknowledged their eldest son's incubus wife, or the changeling child of that union. 'As for me... I recently got out of a... strange relationship. Felt I needed a bit of fresh air.'

'And how is it?' asked Samad, their eyes beautiful and kind. 'The air down here, I mean.'

Blaise sighed, and he gave himself over fully to being in love. Damn Harry Potter anyway, making him into this weak, willsome creature once more. He glanced at the clock on the wall. 'Ask me again in an hour.'

'An hour, hnn?' Samad's voice seemed to prickle all over Blaise's body. 'And what happens in an hour?'

'In an hour, you will either be on a ferry,' said Blaise, 'or you will be spending the rest of the morning with me.'

Samad smiled. 'Oh, just the rest of the morning?' they teased.

'Well,' said Blaise, ducking his head, 'as long as you like.'

 


	4. Chapter 4

IV.

They were running low on wild rice and a few essentials, so they decided to bike into town to market. The morning was warm enough -- 'f- _freezing_!' Samad said, while Blaise kissed a few Everwarm Charms into his hair -- the air only a bit fogged. The ground was thick with snow. If they had not set up weathering wards along these paths, Blaise thought, as he always did in the wintertime, it would be very slow going indeed.

As always he fell behind once they reached the woods, making quick note of any additions and changes amongst his sparrows. Samad whistled back to him; he took a moment to reply.

And then, it seemed--

\--a strangeness came upon them. The further into the woods they fell, the foggier it became, the more difficult it was to sight any birds at all. And yet the fog did not seem to touch the path.

Hm. Blaise whistled once, then twice. Samad did not respond.

It was when the path turned right when it should've gone straight that he realised: this was no natural fog. He sucked in a small breath and felt a faintly familiar pressure, clean and close all along his ribs. And he bit back a smile as he rolled to a stop at the edge of the clearing, free of fog. For he knew what he would find there.

'My Lord Potter,' said Blaise, lowering his head to the man there before him, 'you have found me.'

'Yes, I,' said Lord Potter. 'I did not know I was looking today. Hmm.' He looked around the clearing, quite plainly confused, then he shrugged his shoulders once, and offered up a small, sheepish smile. 'I was aiming for home, actually. I don't think I've ever been here before.'

'We all get turned around sometimes,' said Blaise, placing his bike gently against a sleeping birch. He put a hand on the trunk briefly and sent up a silent apology - and then he turned back to Lord Potter. 'I have never been in this part of the wood either. Come, let me look at you.'

Lord Potter had been eyeing Blaise's bike, but his eyes dragged up Blaise's body at his words. Blaise shook his head at the silent, startled question he read in his face. Lord Potter bit his lip - and then he nodded.

Blaise studied the man carefully. The years had treated him well. He held himself upright. He did not try to hide his cane. He carried none of that suffocating fear or fury he'd lugged around before. And the _control_ he held over his power was...admirable.

His cloak, though! Ahh. Of course Harry Potter would style himself as a Light Lord, Blaise thought regretfully, coming closer. Still it was a shame.

The snow sloughed beneath Blaise's boots, the twigs and moss cracked - but Lord Potter did not flinch or startle away as Blaise came to him. And then Lord Potter was there before him, barely a heartbeat away.

'I cannot say I was expecting you,' said Blaise, embracing him at last, 'but I am glad to see you well.' And he breathed him in till his heart became full. Lord Potter did not react at first - and then he raised up his arms and pulled Blaise tight against him.

'I did not realise before,' said Lord Potter softly. 'That happiness I felt, the first time we met. That was you, wasn't it?'

Blaise laughed, and let himself feel a throb of embarrassment. 'Yes, well, I fall in love very easily,' he lied. 'You were just unfortunate enough to be nearby. As for the rest of it--' He could feel his heart beating hard between them. 'We shall say it was just... an error of fate.'

Lord Potter pulled back with an unfamiliar expression on his face. Blaise kept his arms wrapped very loosely around him. It was only natural, he thought, that he would not understand many of his Lord's expressions.

After all, they did not know each other.

'Whenever I'm stressed,' said Lord Potter, finally, 'no matter where I am, Gin (my wife, Ginny) can always tell. Says she gets a headache,' he raised his hands to Blaise's temple, pressed in gently with his thumbs, 'right here.' Blaise put his hands carefully on his Lord's wrists; held his eyes open; held on. 'And you? Do you feel it, too?'

Blaise found a laugh within himself. 'I barely even notice it most days,' he said lightly. 'You have a very happy marriage, you know.' It was _good_ that his Lord should be happy, he told himself; it was a good thing.

He startled when Lord Potter's thumb traced across his cheek - and that was when he realised what the wetness on his face was. He sucked in a shuddering breath, and let his smile drop.

'Have you been all alone?' asked Lord Potter, quietly. It felt as though he could see straight through Blaise. 'All this time, have you been alone?'

Blaise broke free from his grasp, losing his balance a little in the process. It felt somehow as though the earth was shaking beneath his feet. 'What is this?' he said, backing away. 'What, do you want all the details of all the people I've _fucked_ over the years? Is that it?'

Lord Potter just watched him pace. 'Will it make you feel better?' he said. Oh, a childish question from a still childish man! As if this were down only to _feelings_.

Blaise made a sharp noise of disdain, and turned on his heel, quite ready to be done with this. It was when he nearly fell over and lost his balance that he noticed, finally, that the earth really _was_ shaking. He reached out with both arms as the clearing sunk down further into the earth, mounds of earth raising into walls high and wide above them. Far too tall to climb.

Well - for a human, maybe.

Blaise's eyes slipped closed. Within him, his blood sparked like fire. He opened his mouth, sucking in huge lungfuls of air. Merlin - he could _taste_ him in the very air.  
  
'Don't run away,' he heard Harry say. He opened his eyes slowly, dazed, still licking his lips. Harry stood there with arm outstretched, no sign of strain within him at what he'd just done. 'Please. I've hurt you all these years. Have you spent them all alone?'

 _Is that better? I know you were in pain_.

Blaise swallowed down his desire, and summoned forth his courage. And then he went to him.

'Listen to me,' Blaise said. 'I was alone before you. My people live long... and I had _chosen_ a life alone before you. But you undid all of that. I know you did not mean to, but you made me into someone that wanted love. That needed it.' Harry pushed his forehead against Blaise's, breath fogging out warm. Blaise shut his eyes again tight, breathing him in.

'Maybe I have needed it all along,' he admitted. 'But you made me know it. My life... was one long empty thing without you in it. And then you reached within me, and became a part of me. I have chosen to carry you all of these years. And I won't give you up. I _won't_.' He kissed Harry clumsily, carefully; and he felt the earth tremble. 'I don't know how.'

Harry laughed. 'Oh, Blaise. If there's anything that a near decade of therapy has taught me--' He pulled Blaise closer, so close that they might as well have been one body in two places '--it's that we don't have to carry these things alone.'

'Blaise?'

The crack of a branch. Blaise whirled around - and Samad was there before him, standing beside their bikes at the edge of the clearing, now perfectly normal once more.

'I called you,' Samad said, his voice echoing quiet between them. For the two of them were alone in that place. 'Why... why didn't you answer?'

Blaise took a breath, and he felt the world return to his senses. The chirruping of the sparrows. The sun through the treetops, clearing out the fog. The laughter in his chest from a world away. And Samad, holding himself still and straight, clearly trying not to fret.

'I was thinking to myself about something,' Blaise said, finally. 'Wait for me there - I will tell you.'

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I find I can't help but lose some appreciation for a fic when a writer is overly self-deprecating and glib in the notes immediately after a meaningful scene. So head's up: after Note 2, I'm going to be overly self-deprecating and glib.
> 
> 1\. Although they may have preferred pronoun usage, incubi don't really understand gender the same way that wizards do. This is why Blaise defaults to calling Lily and Samad 'they' upon first seeing them, and why he later calls Samad 'he'.  
> 2\. The Curse Blaise refers to is immortality. As he is half-human, he will not live forever, but he will live for a very long time.  
> 3\. Blaise can Apparate long distances without his wand because of his incubus heritage? I mean... sure. Why not.  
> 4\. I find the first part of this unforgivably uninteresting and ambiguous. I did try my best to make up for it in later chapters, but I'm afraid it's a bit consistent all over. Writing this, I was acutely aware that... not everything you write needs to be published. Sometimes you can just-- you know, learn in silence. Most of all, though, I am grateful to the truly massive amount of silent subscribers who will probably have no opinion either way on the quality of this fic lmaoooo. Anyway, the last chapter will probably be tiny. I probably could've forced it out...but haven't I suffered enough???


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